The Star LabTop Mk III: Open Source Edition Launches on Kickstarter

If you want a powerful desktop computer built to your discerning specifications, it’s easy enough to just build it yourself. But, due to obvious size constraints, there has never been a commercially-successful modular system for building laptops. That means you’re limited to purchasing whatever the manufacturers think you’ll want, and they’re often wrong. The new Star LabTop Mk III: Open Source Edition, however, was designed specifically to fulfill popular customer requests.

The Star LabTop Mk III: Open Source Edition has 18 days left to go in its Kickstarter campaign, and has only reached a small fraction of its funding goal. That’s likely because of the hefty £977 ($1,291 USD) price tag. But that price is understandable when you consider that Star Labs is a small company, and you’re getting quite a lot for your money.

The specifications of the Star LabTop Mk III: Open Source Edition are all top notch. Those include a 1.8GHz quad-core Intel® Core™ i7–8550u with Turbo Boost up to 4.0GHz, 16GB of 2400MHz LPDDR4 RAM, an “over-provisioned” 480GB Star Drive PCIe SSD in the standard model, and a 13.3" full HD IPS LCD screen. The 45.6Wh LiPo battery is good for up to 7 hours of battery life, and is recharged through a 65W USB-C power adapter.

The physical design and construction is also quite impressive. The chassis is made from anodized aluminum, and is just 14.8mm (0.58 inches) thick. The total weight of the laptop is a mere 1.3kg (2.87lbs). There is one USB-C 3.0 port, two USB-A 3.0 ports, an HDMI port, a headphone jack, and a Micro SD card reader. And, for American customers, there is a tactile, backlit keyboard with a US layout.

The “Open Source Edition” part of the name might lead you to believe that the design is open source, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. That refers to the fact that it’s designed to run Ubuntu Linux, and that it utilizes the open-source Coreboot firmware instead of the standard American Megatrends Inc. (AMI) firmware.

If you want a Star LabTop Mk III: Open Source Edition, the Kickstarter campaign will be running until March 30th. Delivery is expected in June.